Friday May 29, 2009 - Gyantse

We left Shigatse and our fabulous hotel around 8 am this morning and we munched on bananas, oranges, and some sweet pastries for breakfast as we drove along in the Truck. Daphne was good as gold! We drove through a beautiful fertile valley for about 2 hours to Gijantse. This is the 4th largest town in T. It is 3977 meters high and 254 kms south west of Lhasa in the fertile plain of the Nyang Chu Valley and on the Friendship Highway which connects Kathmandu to Lhasa. We hear that the town was nearly destroyed in 1954 and was largely emptied of people by the Chinese in 1959, but we are not sure why. Also during the cultural revolution the Fort, the Monastery and Kumbum were ransacked or destroyed. The BBC documentary "A Year in T." focused on the lives of ordinary T. living in this city.On arrival we went straight to the Palcho Monastery and the Kumbum. The monastery was built around the 1400s but was not as big or as elaborate as the one we saw yesterday. Nonetheless, it was fabulous. We saw the Thanka art on the floor in the Assembly Hall. This is Buddhist monks making mandellas with coloured sand, but it looks like they are painting. The mandella isn't permanent, and after some religious rituals it is destroyed. The art in the monasteries is incredible. Many of the statues of the Gods are elaborately constructed, the walls are covered wtih detailed paintings,and beautiful banners hang from the high ceilings all of which completes the monasteries and temples to appear like galleries of religious art.Coming out of the monastery, we entered the Kumbum, the largest chorten or stupa in T. It is six storeis high, with a total of 77 chapels in which are over 10,000 murals and many statues of Gods and Goddesses. It was fascinating climbingh a level, 3 times around clockwise, then on tho the next level. The bonus was the views from the top which looked out over the city to the fort and the mountains encircling the town.When we finished at the Monastery we checked into the hotel then went for lunch with some of the group from the Truck.After lunch, we went to the Gyantse Dzong Fort. It was originally constructed in 1390 to guard the southern approach to the valley. It is built on a piece of rock jutting out of the valley floor. The story goes that 500 soldiers of the Gyantse dzong held the fort for several days before they were overcome by the British forces in 1904 during the "Younghusband" expedition. It is largely in ruin, but the steep and sometimes dangerous climb to the top was well worth the effort to see an even higher view over the city.By that time it was 4 pm and Ray and I rushed back to the hotel for an emergency loo visit. Lunch perhaps, we guessed.For the rest of the day we wandered around the small town and then used the Internet to try to catch up with the blog.The evening was cold without the sun and I put on lots more clothes before going out for dinner. Then back to the room for bed at 9:30 pm. Guess, its the altitude, plus, I have a bad cold and I'm just wiped by bed-time!